Domino’s in Glasgow Adds Kilts as an Official Uniform

No matter where Domino’s sets up shop, the international chain has never shied away from embracing local flavors—and at their new location in Glasgow, the Scottish influence extends beyond pizza toppings. Staff members can be seen wearing official kilts made with Domino’s exclusive tartan, Adweek reports.

The wardrobe update follows a Domino’s survey that found that two-thirds of their Scottish employees would enjoy wearing a kilt to work. (Only a third of the general Scottish workforce could say the same.) The company hired Ken MacDonald of Houston Kiltmakers to create the special design. The pattern, which comes in Domino’s signature blue and red, has been inducted into the official Scottish Register of Tartans.

“Domino’s has been in Scotland for over 20 years so we have strong ties and affinity with the country, the people, and the culture,” Scott Couper, the manager at Domino’s Glasgow Central, said in a statement. “The kilt is very much a family tradition in Scotland and that is how we see ourselves at—one big family all striving for the same goal of delivering freshly made, great tasting food to pizza lovers all over the country.”

The kilt is optional, so employees who aren’t partial to the breezy, patriotic garb can keep their trousers on. But Domino’s makes it clear there’s one area where they won’t bend to tradition: Underpants must be worn at all times.

Why stop at bringing your own grocery bags to the store? One London grocery wants you to BYO-Tupperware. The London Evening Standardreports that a UK chain called Planet Organic has partnered with Unpackaged—a company dedicated to sustainable packaging—to install self-serve bulk-food dispensers where customers can fill their own reusable containers with dry goods, cutting down on plastic packaging waste.

To use the system, customers walk up and weigh their empty container at a self-serve station, printing and attaching a label with its tare weight. Then, they can fill it with flour, nuts, or other kinds of dry goods, weigh it again, and print the price tag before taking it up to the check out. (Regular customers only have to weigh their containers once, since they can save the peel-off label to use again next time.)

Planet Organic is offering cereals, legumes, grains, nuts, chocolate, dried fruit, and even some cleaning products in bulk as part of this program, significantly reducing the amount of waste shoppers would otherwise be taking home on each grocery trip.

Zero-waste grocery stores have been popping up in Europe for several years. These shops, like Berlin's Original Unverpackt, don't offer any bags or containers, asking customers bring their own instead. This strategy also encourages people to buy only what they need, which eliminates food waste—there's no need to buy a full 5-pound bag of flour if you only want to make one cake.

The concept is also gaining traction in North America. The no-packaging grocery store in.gredients opened in Austin, Texas in 2011. The Brooklyn store Package Free, opened in 2017, takes the idea even further, marketing itself as a one-stop shop for "everything that you'd need to transition to a low waste lifestyle." It sells everything from tote bags to laundry detergent to dental floss.

When it comes to processed foods, the palate of the average American isn't very adventurous. A bag of pickle-flavored Lay's chips might be a radical snack option. But if researchers in Denmark are on the right track, we may soon be crunching a very different kind of treat: jellyfish chips, as Futurism reports.

The ethereal-looking marine animals are usually recognized for their squishy frames and sometimes as a threat due to their venomous sting. They're often prepared for human consumption in Asian cultures, with the body being marinated in salt and potassium for weeks to create a crunchy delicacy. Recently, Danish scientists at the University of Southern Denmark were able to expedite this process, using ethanol to create a crispy jellyfish chip in a matter of days.

Mie T. Pedersen

Why bother? Due to overfishing, more popular seafoods are experiencing shortages. The jellyfish, however, have a flourishing population and are rich in vitamins and minerals.

Right now, researchers are focused on the microscopic changes that take place when processing a jellyfish from its gooey natural state to a hardened, crunchy form. It could be a while before any serious product development is conducted. And as far as taste goes, it might need a bit of seasoning. The current process for making jellyfish consumable results in a taste that some have compared to eating a salty rubber band.